#cyberpolitics/Germany

24/5/2017 KNE

The proposed law with the long name aims to rid social network sites of hate speech. The decision process would be outsourced to private companies, meaning any controversial content would be deleted in order to avoid draconic fines without having to justify their reasoning. As most hate speech lies in a legal grey zone, Facebook et. al. would be able to decide what is morally acceptable online. The proposed law ultimately risks censoring nonconformist opinions or at least driving them further away from societal mainstream (or at least social networks).

#techstuff

19/10/2016 KNE

Last week WikiLeaks published thousands of hacked emails from Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman, John Podesta. In July, more than 19,000 emails from the Democratic National Committee were hacked and published by WikiLeaks, which prompted the resignation of its chairwoman. U.S. intelligence agencies and the White House are blaming Russia for the hacks. Is the Kremlin directly interfering with the US presidential election?

#techstuff

21/05/2016 KNE

India will soon be Facebook's largest market and that won't change considering the country's huge growth possibilities. With "Free Basics" the company tried to convince India that it was giving the poor "vital resources for health and education", even though in reality it was essentially pursuing a business strategy to win over future prosumers. The Indian internet community made net neutrality something worthwhile fighting for and won the uneven battle.

#techstuff

15/05/2016 KNE

Hans-Georg Maaßen, the head of Germany's domestic security agency, recently declared that "cyberspace is a place of hybrid warfare" and that secret information in government, administration, business, academia and research in Germany is "permanently threatened".

This was a reaction to Russia's increasing willingness to collaborate with hacker groups and sabotage essential infrastructure.

#techstuff

03/05/2016 KNE

On 2 May 2016, Craig Steven Wright came out as the creator of bitcoin in several interviews with news outlets and on his blog. According to the The Economist and the BBC, their journalists have seen Wright signing a message with the private key associated with the first bitcoin transaction. If this is true, Wright would be the owner of the original 1m bitcoin, which would now be worth £307m or 389m €. However, the internet (i.e. reddit) is questioning his claims.